


No man is rich enough to buy back his past

by Onlythegodsarereal



Series: The future influences the present just as much as the past [2]
Category: Wiedźmin | The Witcher - All Media Types
Genre: Brothels, First Kiss, M/M, Mutual Pining, discussion of Jaskier's past in Oxenfurt, so beware of discussion of prostitution, the fic is set in a brothel, the prostitutes are all of age and healthy
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-17
Updated: 2020-08-17
Packaged: 2021-03-06 05:07:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,486
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25957999
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Onlythegodsarereal/pseuds/Onlythegodsarereal
Summary: “I’ll compose a song out of it,” he announced sitting proudly on the mattress next to Geralt, “How the lowly bard saved the great White Wolf.”“The moment I’ll be able to get out of this bed without bleeding on the floor, I’m going to smash that lute of yours,” Geralt said menacing.“You wouldn’t!” Jaskier exclaimed with exaggerated affront and Geralt had to hide back a smile.“Try me,” Geralt replied with a grunt. “Tell me, how did you get a brothel’s owner so fond of you that she accepted to heal a witcher free of his coin?” he asked then still wary of the situation he had found himself in.
Relationships: Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia/Jaskier | Dandelion
Series: The future influences the present just as much as the past [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1673185
Comments: 4
Kudos: 32





	No man is rich enough to buy back his past

**Author's Note:**

> Hi everyone! This is the continuation of my fic "And every sinner has a future", you don't need to have read that one to understand this though. To give some background: the first part (And every sinner has a future) happens little less than a year before Geralt meets Yennefer while this fic happens a handful of months after Yen and the genie happen (in the netflix series universe). 
> 
> Hope you enjoy this one!

The first thing that Geralt’s senses detected before he could even open his eyes, was the faint smell of sex and alcohol. Then came the voices, muffled and distant, but present, accompanied by lively music which Geralt could vaguely recognize. He opened his eyes with a grunt and he found himself in a tidy bedroom. It didn’t seem the room of an inn, more the room of a private house, but the smell filtering through the door couldn’t lie.

“Why does it smell like I am in a fucking brothel?” he asked, more to test his coarse voice than anything else. To his surprise, a voice answered him.

“Because you’re in one, clearly.” It was the voice of young woman, delicate and whispery-like, Geralt turned towards her, not without a grunt of pain, and the woman entered in his line of vision: she couldn’t be more than twenty years old, with long, brown and straight hair covering her tanned face, she was just on the safe side of too thin, with sharp cheekbones and clavicles visible even under her dress and big round brown eyes that only helped to make her look younger. She was sitting in a chair beside the bed where he was laying, a book in her slender hands.

“Where am I?” he asked slowly not to scare the poor girl.

“You’re at the Lips of Rose just outside Hochebuz, a brothel as you already guessed.” The girl answered putting down her book and standing up. She neared the door and opened it slightly. “Cat! The witcher woke up!” she called with no regard to Geralt’s headache. He grunted.

“How did I arrive here?” he asked when the girl was back in her chair.

He remembered being around Hochebuz and he remembered the shapeshifter attack, he also remembered telling Jaskier to… Jaskier! “The bard, there was a bard with me, did he”

“The bard is fine.” A woman interrupted him entering the room. Her words sounded almost like an accusation. “You can go, Eli, thank you.”

The girl nodded and quickly left the room, leaving her book behind. Geralt watched the woman intently, she was human, no doubt of that, Geralt could smell it on her, he could also smell annoyance and a vague sense of anger that she was hiding very well. She was older than Eli, probably around Jaskier age, with softer features too, and amber eyes, even though the hair was almost the same: long, straight, brown, and flowing down her shoulders and back.

“In fact, Julian is the only reason you’re here, witcher.” She said approaching the bed to give him an apprehensive look. Geralt took longer than he would have liked to admit to remember who Julian even was.

“Is he wounded?” he asked trying to conceal his worry.

She scoffed.

“Do you think he would have been able to bring you here if he had been wounded? No, he had a couple of bruises, but I took care of that. You instead, oh well, for a moment I thought that not even your witcher potions could have helped you. You’re lucky you were so close and that Julian remembered I came here.”

“Was there a horse with him?” Geralt inquired suddenly worried about Roach’s fate.

“He brought you on that horse, you wouldn’t have made it otherwise. She’s in the barn now, I sent Arthur to take care of her, he’s good with animals, but he’ll probably spoil her a bit.” She warned him with a fond sigh and Geralt thought that Roach probably deserved a bit of spoiling.

“Thank you for your help. I have money to repay you.” Geralt replied. It was clear the woman was not happy to have him there and that she was repaying whatever favor she owed Jaskier. She scoffed again while rummaging in a cupboard.

“There is no need to pay anything, witcher. I’m doing this for Julian. I couldn’t bear to see him so distraught like the other day.” That words made Geralt pause, for several reasons.

“How long I’ve been out?”

“Two days. I told you it was bad, you almost left us around yesterday morning.” She answered going back to the bed with a small bottle in her hand. “Drink this,” she ordered putting the bottle in his hand. “Then we’ll redress the wound and only then I’ll call Julian, it’s impossible to work with him fretting over you like a fucking mother-hen.”

“What’s a healer doing in a brothel?” he asked her after drinking the concoction. It tasted like herbs and some kind of flower and it wasn’t half as bad as he had thought.

“I’m not a healer.” She answered signing him to remove the covers to let her see his wound. “I own the place.”

“You know enough to save my life from a shapeshifter’s wound. Using witcher’s potions.” He noted raising an eyebrow.

“Luckily for you.” She said checking the said wound with a critical eye.

“How do you know Jaskier?” he pressed, unsettled by the woman’s evasiveness. She stood up looking at him with an icy stare.

“Funny. He told me you’re usually the taciturn kind.” She commented coldly before turning around to take what was needed to redress the wound. Geralt took the hint and closed his mouth. If Jaskier trusted her he could trust her too.

They remained in awkward silence until the woman finished redressing the wound.

“Thank you, I’ll be out of your hair now.” He said trying to get out of the bed, but the woman gently pushed him back down.

“I doubt that. You might be a witcher, but something like that will take time to heal, you’ll be able to walk around by tonight, but I’ll doubt you’ll be able to walk on the road for another whole day and ride for another couple days.” She explained.

“I don’t want to impose myself on you.”

She shrugged.

“It’s either this or bleeding to death on your horse, witcher. Julian would never forgive me if I let you chose the second option.” She replied tidying up her things. “I’m going to tell him that he can come now, maybe he’ll finally stop moping around.” She added before getting out of the room.

Geralt sighed. He was in a lot less pain. Whatever the woman had put in that potion it was having an effect, there was no way she hadn’t had some healing training. He realized he hadn’t even asked her name. Eli, the young woman that had been there before, had called her Cat. Probably not her real name, but Geralt could make it work for the time being.

Jaskier arrived a handful of moments later and in less than ten minutes went through all the phases of, well, being Jaskier probably. He went from relieved to elated to excited, passing then through angry, worried, and even sad for a moment, just to go back to excited immediately after, he concluded with anger again, just to be sure, annoyed and then bragging.

“I’ll compose a song out of it,” he announced sitting proudly on the mattress next to Geralt, “How the lowly bard saved the great White Wolf.”

“The moment I’ll be able to get out of this bed without bleeding on the floor, I’m going to smash that lute of yours.” Geralt said menacing.

“You wouldn’t!” Jaskier exclaimed with exaggerated affront and Geralt had to hide back a smile.

“Try me.” Geralt replied with a grunt. “Tell me, how did you get a brothel’s owner so fond of you that she accepted to heal a witcher free of his coin?” he asked then still wary of the situation he had found himself in. Jaskier shrugged.

“Cat and I go way back, we studied together at Oxenfurt. She was on her way to become the best cerusic of the whole Continent.”

“While you were on your way to visit all the beds of the university’s dormitory?” Jaskier rolled his eyes at that.

“I had my shares of romantic exploits, yes. Cat was one of them for a while, never managed to get her to say yes, though. She used to say we were too similar.” Geralt huffed unconvinced. “Oh, don’t make that face, we were different people back then: I was a little bit more boring, while she was a little bit funnier. And, after all, you only saw her while she’s pouting at me.”

“If anything she was pouting at me.” Jaskier waved a hand in the air to dismiss Geralt's comment.

“Cat has never been that direct. She gives you the cold shoulder because she’s angry at me and she’s angry at me because she’s actually angry at herself for being angry at me for something she knows she shouldn’t be angry for.” Geralt looked at him unimpressed. “I’m sorry if I brought you in the house of a person with more than three emotions, Geralt, next time I’ll leave you to die in a freezing forest so you don’t have to confront yourself with human emotions.”

A soft knock on the door interrupted whatever ridiculous thing Jaskier was going to say next. The young girl from earlier, Eli, Geralt remembered, appeared shyly in the door’s frame.

“Master Jaskier, Cat says that if you’re still intentioned to play tonight you should go down now to get ready.” She said in a soft voice.

“Oh, yes, right. The only way Cat will let me repay her for her kindness. I’ll probably play for the whole night. You should rest.” Jaskier replied while getting down from the bed.

“It isn’t like I have much more to do.” Geralt said.

“Yes, maybe, but I know you and I’m sure you’ll find some way to put yourself in danger again,” Jaskier commented shaking his head slightly. “I’ll let him in your hands, Eli. Don’t scare him too much.” He added then to the girl before disappearing outside the door. Eli gave a small amused smile and entered closing the door behind herself, she had a bundle of clothes in her hand which she deposited on the small table near the window.

“These are some new clothes for you and Arthur and Cecyl are coming up with some hot water so you can wash, you should be able to take a bath tomorrow morning if you wish. We would have let you take one now, but clients are starting to arrive and it would be a little complicated.” She explained in her soft voice.

“Thank you.” Geralt replied trying to sound less menacing possible and testing his ability to sit up: not too bad.

“The clothes should fit you.” Eli went on, probably waiting for the boys to bring up the water. “Another witcher left them here before a hunt and he never…” she stopped suddenly as if she had remembered something terrible only that moment. “He never came back to take them.” She concluded shakily. “I can find other clothes if this is a problem.” She immediately added.

Geralt grunted.

“It won’t be. Don’t worry.”

Eli looked clearly more relived. Geralt reached for his medallion on his chest, an old habit to which he came back to at times when he felt out of place and realized, not with a small amount of terror, that it wasn’t there anymore. How could he have noticed just then?

“Eli. Where is my medallion?” he asked slowly trying to hide the building anger in his voice. The girl’s face showed panic for only a moment then she shrugged forcefully and smiled once again.

“We must have brought it down with your clothes that needed to be cleaned, I can ask Arthur and Cec to go search for it when they arrive.”

Geralt nodded reassured.

From downstairs was coming lively and familiar music. Geralt conceded himself a moment to enjoy it closing his eyes and laying down on the bed. When he opened them again, Eli was watching over him thoughtfully.

"Shouldn't you be working?" he asked then with a groan while trying to sit on his own. She shook her head.

"I'm not allowed to work with the others downstairs," she explained plainly, but before Geralt could inquire what the hell was she doing in a brothel then, they heard a polite knock at the door immediately followed by a hushed argument.

"They must be Cec and Arthur with the water for you," Eli said and went to open the door.

Two handsome young men entered carrying a not-as-small-as-he-had-thought basin full of steaming water.

"You shouldn't be here, Eli." The first one, with a mop of curly black hair, told the young woman sternly.

"You're not my keeper, Art. And Cat asked me to watch over our guest."

"Well, she told you to keep an eye on him actually." The second man, with lustrous blonde hair and striking green eyes, corrected her. Eli swatted him hard on the arm.

"Cec!"

"It's fine." Geralt reassured. "I had the vague sense your matron wasn't exactly ecstatic to have me here."

"It isn't a witcher thing, don't worry, Cat doesn't care for this kind of stuff," Eli replied kindly.

"No, it's more something with you specifically." said the one called Cecyl gaining another hit on the arm.

"Uh, yeah, Cat's was seething when master Jaskier brought you here," Arthur added even wincing at the memory.

"There's a bets’ pool going on with the others on why she hates you so much. My money is on 'former lover'."

Eli gave a small outraged whimper and started swatting at the two young men indiscriminately pushing them out of the room.

"You are absolutely the worst, go to work now before you do any more damages."

The two of them laughed joyfully but did as they were told and soon Geralt could hear their laughter down the stairs.

"I'm so sorry about Cec and Arthur, they were completely inappropriate."

"They work in a brothel." Geralt pointed out dryly.

"Still, hospitality is hospitality in a castle as in a brothel."

"Mmh." Geralt grunted uninterested in the young woman's life philosophy. He was more curious about her role in the brothel after learning that she didn't work as a prostitute, but the dull pain at his side reminded him that he had a more pressing thing to focus on, like a quick recovery.

"It'll be better if I go searching for your medallion now before someone of the others decides to keep it for themselves," Eli said leaving a small bar of soap near the basin. "Take all the time you need. The stairs on the left of this room will lead you directly to the kitchen avoiding the main room, use them if you’re hungry."

"Thank you."

She waved a hand in the air dismissively.

"In the kitchen, you can hear the music better too." She added with a knowing smile before closing the door behind her.


End file.
